Why juicing is the perfect summer cleanse

Summer is a time for fun, spending time with friends and family and enjoying the sunshine. There is something truly magical about this time of year that makes us want to lighten up (literally and metaphorically) and embrace the organic supermarket fruit and vegetables section. Our appetites wane slightly, we have the urge to exercise more, and our bodies intuitively want to shake off excess weight. In a nutshell, it's the ideal time to embrace nutrient-packed juices or, better still, consult with a trusted medical professional about embarking on a juice cleanse regimen.

It's widely known that many of us need to up our game when it comes to fruit and vegetable intake. Even if you are eating the recommended servings of fruit and vegetables how many of those are raw, meaning you’re getting the most nutrient-rich bang for your buck?

Freshly made cold pressed juices are the simplest solution. Even if you already follow a plant-based diet, you’ll quickly feel the benefits of supercharging your consumption of enzymes, phytonutrients and living water into your body this way. Recent studies have found that a three-day organic juice cleanse improved the healthy balance of gastrointestinal microflora. That leads to boosted immunity, improved digestion, and reduction of harmful free radicals in the body. Study participants also reported feeling significant boost in energy up to two weeks later and an average weight loss of two kilograms. In short, juicing supercharges your body and helps set you on a healthy path for the warmer months.

So, what should we be juicing?

Summer is the perfect season to cleanse, the fruit and vegetables that traditionally appear in summer are perfect for juicing. Plant-based foods that are at their peak in the summer provide us the best vitamins, minerals, phytonutrients, living waters, sun light, and energy we need for our health coming out of winter, says Gary Dowse, aka The Juice Chef. 

Summer is the season of new growth, he says, when we start to see green again on trees and in our gardens after the barren chill of winter. And in that vein, it’s also the ideal time to embrace green juices, which contain ingredients seasonal to summer and packing the energy punch we all need this time of year. “Think sprouts, leafy greens, and herbs (like parsley and basil) as well as any green vegetables that grow above the ground, like celery, cucumber and zucchini,” Gary says. “All these green foods provide us with minerals like sodium and potassium to help us move our bodies more, and an important green nutrient known as chlorophyll helps us get our blood pumping.”

The magic of chorophyll

Chlorophyll is a powerful plant-based nutrient, often referred to as a plant’s blood, that helps them absorb energy from sunlight and is what gives them their green colour. When consumed, it is a powerful anti-inflammatory, helps the body detoxify, fights oxidative stress, protects the liver, boosts the immune system, boosts energy levels, and may even have anti-ageing properties.

Eating and juicing green herbs and vegetables is one of the best ways to get more chlorophyll into your diet. A cold press juicer is the best machine to extract the maximum amount of green juice and allows you to store the juice in the fridge for up to three days without loss of nutrients.

While there are plenty of ‘liquid chlorophyll’ supplements available in health food stores, and even supermarkets, they don’t actually contain chlorophyll. Rather, they feature a compound called chlorophyllin, a semi-synthetic mixture of sodium copper salts isolated from chlorophyll. The bottom line: always opt for fresh over supplements. “You’ll soon see how it outperforms the man-made versions,” agrees Gary. Foods with the highest chlorophyll content ideal for juicing in summer include broccoli, brussel sprouts, celery, coriander, parsley, spinach, silver beet, and the hero of the chlorophyll world thanks to its high concentration, wheatgrass.

What about the other colours in the rainbow?

Gentle warming foods like fennel and cabbage are also good for summer as they help you make the transition from the colder months into the warmer season, says Gary. Both are high in folate, potassium, and vitamin C, which are great for heart health and our immune systems.

We have more warmth in the air in summer, we should start to introduce the orange and deep red colour foods like rockmelon, carrot, beetroot, and cherries to our juices, says Gary, as they will take your energy up another notch. Red and orange vegetables are high in antioxidants, including vitamins A and C, great for anti-inflammation and anti-ageing.

Sound great? We agree. See you in the supermarket organics section!

Lifestyle tips to create a healthy gut

Our gut can influence our general health, mental health, skin, and so much more. Fortunately, if we give our gut some love, we can really reap the benefits quite quickly. The article below covers some strategies we can take to work on improving our gut ecosystem! Take a read and see how you go implementing some of the changes!

Love your gut, your second brain: advice from Registered Dietitian Jo Travers

Our gut health has the power to impact not only our physical wellbeing, but also our mental health and mood. This is due to a direct link between the gut and the brain, called the gut-brain axis.

The gut and the brain ‘talk’ to each other on a regular basis, using special chemical messengers produced by the billions of different bacteria that live in our gut. For example, among these we can find dopamine and serotonin – also known as happiness or ‘feel-good’ hormones. Although gut-brain axis communication is two-way, over 80% of the messages are actually sent from the gut to the brain rather than the other way round. So, it really does pay to give your gut some love!

As Jo Travers explains: “The gut is connected to many of the body’s organs, whether it’s through digestive enzymes or the link to the immune system, and its connection with the brain is one we can absolutely use to our advantage.

“Although scientists are still working to fully understand this two way street, it appears that the gut is attuned to the signalling and functionality of the brain and vice versa, so if conditions are less favourable in either place, then this can affect the other.”

To help us give our gut (and brain!) the love and attention it deserves, Jo has shared her top tips on how we can begin:

Get enough sleep

Sufficient sleep is something everyone needs. Found yourself resisting sleep to watch another episode of that favourite box set? This unfortunately means you may be depriving yourself of sleep which in turn, won’t help communication between the gut and the brain.

The bacteria in the gut directly communicate with the central nervous system and disrupted sleep can affect the levels of bacteria in the gut.

Manage your stress levels

Because of the unique link between the gut and the brain, mental stress can affect what happens in the gut. We’ve all had “butterflies” when we are nervous and many people who suffer with IBS notice their symptoms getting worse if they are stressed.

This mental stress can actually alter hormones that work on the gut. By practicing meditation, or any relaxing activity, you can reduce stress and help your gut get back to normal functioning again.

Nourish the gut (bacteria)

There is some evidence that what you eat can affect how you feel mentally, via the gut-brain axis. Fibre from plants feeds the bacteria in the gut that, in turn, produce chemicals to communicate with the brain.

The greater variety of plant foods you eat, the broader the range of useful bacteria your gut can support.

Include Fermented foods

Fermented foods like kombucha, kefir or other fermented milk products actually contain bacteria that can alter brain activity via signalling pathways in the gut-brain axis. The consumption of fermented food was shown to reduce social anxiety in young women.

Increase polyphenols

Polyphenols are plant compounds that are thought to be involved in the gut-brain axis. Polyphenols help gut health by encouraging the growth of useful bacteria like Bifidobacterium strains and inhibiting the growth of “bad” bacteria such as C. difficile. Eating foods that are high in polyphenols has also been shown to affect cognition.’

Article source: https://loveyourgut.com/all-entries/love-your-gut-week-2021-registered-dietitian-jo-travers-shares-her-tips-on-the-gut-brain-axis-and-how-to-nurture-it-for-good-gut-health-happy-love-your-gut-week-2021/

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Ayurvedic practices to enhance your health & digestion

Overall health and well-being is so much more than just the absence of disease or illness. It should include the state of our mental health, our senses, and what we are actively doing to nurture and care for our bodies to prevent negative disruptions - illness or otherwise. Ayurveda takes a very holistic approach to wellness, the article below discusses in more detail what we can do to support a healthy and happy life..

‘The healing tradition of Ayurveda teaches that health and wellbeing depends upon our ability to digest everything we take in from the environment. This includes not only tangible substances like food and drink, but also our experiences, emotions, and the impressions we take in via our sensory portals, namely our eyes, ears, nose, tongue, and skin.

Agni is the Sanskrit term for the “digestive fire” that breaks down the food and other things we ingest from the environment, assimilating what is useful, and eliminating the rest.

When our digestive ability, or agni, is strong, we create healthy tissues, eliminate waste products efficiently, and produce a subtle essence called ojas. Ojas, which is a Sanskrit word that means strength, can be envisioned as the innermost vital essence. According to Ayurveda, ojas is the basis for clarity of perception, physical strength, and immunity. On the other hand, if our agni is weakened through improper eating, lack of activity, negative emotional energy or unhealthy daily routine, our digestion will be hampered and we produce toxins that get stored in the body. According to Ayurveda, this toxic residue, known as ama, is the root cause of disease.

Uncovering the Root Causes of Digestive Issues

Whether we are coping with weight issues or uncomfortable GI symptoms such as bloating, gas, or indigestion, often the underlying root problem is weak agni, or poor digestion. Unfortunately, in Western medicine, we aren’t trained to ask the key question “How strong is my digestive fire?” Instead, we concentrate solely on the foods going in. When a patient goes to a health care provider trained in conventional allopathic medicine, the treatment options for digestive issues are typically medications, which serve to control symptoms, but do not treat the underlying cause.

Even when a provider’s approach includes testing and the elimination of offending foods, this is still only addressing part of the problem. While this treatment addresses the agent (or food) being ingested, it doesn’t look at why it is not being digested properly. Although eliminating foods that are bothersome can often alleviate symptoms, it is often difficult for patients to continually avoid those foods. It can often begin to disrupt their quality of life. The Ayurvedic concept of agni allows us to expand the conversation into answering the most important questions: “Why did the body begin to improperly digest, or not tolerate, this food?” and “How can we both eliminate the offending agent and concurrently increase agni or digestive power?” This approach opens up the possibility of re-introducing the food at a future time, allowing the person to fully experience foods again.

Getting Practical

Ayurveda recommends a variety of practical techniques for keeping our digestive fire strong. Incorporating these practices into your daily life can strengthen agni and, in turn, facilitate weight loss, improve the metabolism of food, and minimise uncomfortable GI symptoms.

Here are six powerful ways to strengthen your agni:

1. Meditate on a regular basis. Studies are increasingly confirming the genetic changes that occur with regular meditation, which can help restore the body’s homeostasis, including the processes controlling digestion. To achieve maximum benefit, meditate for 20 to 30 minutes, twice daily, once in the morning and once in the evening. To get started with meditation or to deepen your meditation practice, please visit the Chopra Center’s Meditation Resource Library.

2. Do some form of daily movement. Whether it is a little yoga every morning, or a daily walk, a recent study published in Diabetes Care showed that a short 15-minute walk after each meal helped to control sugar spikes after eating. These short post-meal walks were more effective than taking a longer, 45-minute walk once daily.

3. Don’t overeat. When we eat more food than our stomach can accommodate, we cannot properly break it down. We also tend to produce more acid, thus causing reflux and indigestion. In addition, the amount of digestive enzymes produced may not be able to completely break down the volume of food ingested, which leads to more gas formation, discomfort, or bloating. Ayurveda recommends that we leave one-third to one-quarter of our stomach empty to allow space for our body to easily digest our meal.

   Here is a simple way to gauge an ideal portion of food for a meal based on your body size: Cup your hands together with your fingertips touching, forming the shape of a bowl. The recommended amount of food for a meal is the equivalent of two of these handfuls of food. Of course, you can eat less than two handfuls if your appetite is smaller.

4. Sip on ginger tea throughout the day, and with meals. Ginger is known in Ayurveda as the “universal remedy” due to its many benefits for the body, and it has been used for more than 2,000 years to treat digestive issues. Ginger can relax the smooth muscle of the intestines, thereby relieving symptoms of gas and cramping.

   A recent study in the European Journal of Gastroenterology and Hepatology found that ginger stimulates digestion by speeding up the movement of food from the stomach into the small intestine, and helps eliminates digestive discomfort after eating. In addition, ginger can stimulate saliva, bile, and gastric enzymes to aid in digestion of the food that has been ingested. The researchers concluded that these beneficial effects are a result of phenolic compounds, primarily gingerol and shogaol, and various other volatile oils that are present in ginger.

   Ginger Tea Recipe: Ginger tea is refreshing and easy to make. Just add one teaspoon of grated or sliced fresh ginger root to a cup of hot water. You can prepare a larger batch and keep it with you in a thermos bottle to sip throughout the day.

5. Eat your largest meal at lunchtime. Our bodies are most able to digest food at midday, when we are active. As studies have found, our digestive system secretes the highest concentration of “digestive juices” around noon, making this the best time to eat our largest meal. In the evening, our bodies are slowing down and preparing for sleep. If we eat our biggest meal at dinner, when our digestive fire is weaker, we will feel heavy and bloated and will be more likely to have difficulty falling asleep.

6. Focus on releasing negative emotions. You’ve no doubt noticed that your emotions influence your digestion. You may get heartburn when you’re under stress, lose your appetite when you feel sad, or become nauseated or even throw up before a big exam or presentation. A growing body of research is finding that the stress associated with unprocessed negative emotions can inhibit the natural digestive process and lead to chronic digestive issues.

   As we now know, a complex, independent nervous system called the enteric nervous system (ENS) lines the gastrointestinal tract. Dubbed “the second brain” by Dr. Michael Gershon, a researcher and physician at Columbia University Medical Center, the ENS contains many of the major neurotransmitters that are found in the brain, including serotonin, dopamine, glutamate, norepinephrine, and nitric oxide. In fact, about 95 percent of the serotonin contained in the body at any given time is in the ENS.

   This second brain controls our digestion and can work both independently and in conjunction with the brain in our head. Without getting bogged down in the details of this intricate system, we can briefly state that there is an intimate relationship between our brain and our gut, and our digestion responds to the thoughts and emotions. When we experience a situation that we interpret as stressful, signals from the brain can alter nerve function between the stomach and oesophagus, resulting in heartburn. With extreme stress, the brain sends signals to the gut immune cells that release chemicals leading to inflammation. This inflammation can then lead to malabsorption, and even food sensitivities if the stress becomes chronic. By learning how to manage stress and release emotional turbulence, we help our digestive tract to work naturally and efficiently.

Proper digestion, with a strong agni, plays a central role in our physical and emotional wellbeing. As Ayurveda recognises, we are not what we eat, but “we are what we digest.” By making choices that strengthen our digestive ability, we form the foundation for good health and vitality.’

Article Source: https://www.deepakchopra.com/articles/six-ayurvedic-practices-to-improve-your-digestion/
Article author: Deepak Chopra

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Diet Duality: Getting the Balance Right

You can’t appreciate the light without darkness, rewards without challenges, inhalation without exhalation and movement without stillness. Life is a constant dance between contrasting situations, ideas, and states of being. It is only fair then that we afford this same leniency and appreciation to our diet – being conscious and making healthy choices as much as possible, yet also allowing some freedom and flexibility and being kind to ourselves when we do. Because we won’t get it perfect all of the time and we need to be open to that idea, in order to set ourselves up for success and not be easily defeated or disappointed. 

So many people struggle with this concept of duality when it comes to diet. Because unlike many situations in life, diet should be easily controllable, right? For the most part, we can choose what we feed ourselves, we have the power to control our weight and nutritional wellbeing. Unfortunately, as with anything that we have control over, it can open the door to self-criticism and guilt if we don’t make the “perfect” choices all of the time. Additionally, we don’t always appreciate that the drivers behind our dietary choices and ability to stick to them are multifactorial and complex. Our relationship with food can be quite intricate and can stem from a lifetime of environmental factors. It is therefore not uncommon for people to have a tendency toward an ‘all or nothing’ approach to diet. Either we are following the “perfect diet” all of the time, or, there is a lapse and we go the complete opposite direction. It can be difficult to comfortably dance the line between making mostly healthful choices and occasional nutrient poorer choices. 

Like yoga, a healthy diet works best when we can remain neutral in times of celebration and relaxation with our diet, not focusing on what we could have done better or what the impact of the less healthy option(s) will have – essentially, detachment. Guilt associated with our diet can feed into emotional eating and can even have a flow on effect to our mood day to day. One relaxed snack, meal, or day is not going to have a significant impact on anything. However, if we ruminate on this and then continue to indulge, this will make a difference over days, weeks and months. Having the ability to enjoy yourself and then return to your regular, healthy diet is when people really flourish. There is equilibrium. Afterall, life is fleeting, we want to support good health and quality of life well into the future but we also want to enjoy ourselves with people we care about - even if that means straying from your regular diet from time to time. 

Take this as a gentle reminder to be kind to yourself. To anticipate the detours from your ideal diet and to accept that, then move forward. As controllable as diet is, it is far more complex than we give it credit and there will be bumps in the road! Try not to villainise food or nutrients - good vs bad - this can unknowingly create unhealthy attitudes and behaviours around food, which often have the opposite effect to what people want. Rather, know what to limit and what to focus more on. It is never too late to make changes and your body and mind will thank you for that.


Author: Belinda Elwin, Dietitian & Nutritionist, APD

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Nutrition to Support Mental Health

Our bodies are extremely complex. Far more than we often appreciate. At any one moment, there are thousands of different systems working in synchrony together, just to keep us functioning and performing our day-to-day tasks. It is therefore natural that such a complex organism requires the right balance, quality and quantity of fuel in order to keep it performing to the best of its ability. When we neglect our diets, it can very quickly take its toll on many different processes within the body, including our brain functioning – mood, concentration, energy levels, memory and so on.

So what dietary measures can we take to ensure we are supporting our mental health? There are many nutrients and dietary characteristics that play key roles in our brain and mood, this article will introduce the gut microbiome and omega-3 fatty acids.

The Gut-Brain Axis  

Simply put, your brain and gut communicate with one another. Gut microbiota play an important role in these exchanges. The gut microbiome is an area that has been receiving a lot of attention recently. We have learned a lot about it but there is a lot to still be explored! What we do know is that our gut houses trillions of microorganisms with thousands of different species, some beneficial and some harmful, but in the healthy individual they coexist quite harmoniously. Each person has a very unique microbiome that is cultivated before we are even born and can quite quickly adapt to our changing lifestyles and conditions [1,2,3].

Changes in the diversity of our microbiota can actually directly affect our mood. Fortunately, diet is one way we can enhance our microbiome ecosystem. Our gut microbiota love prebiotics, which are readily available in many common foods. The same foods lower inflammation in the body, which can decrease the risk/ severity of numerous mental health disorders, as well as many other lifestyle related diseases [2,3]. In order to nurture happy & healthy gut microbiota, try incorporating more of the following prebiotic rich foods in to your diet:

• A range of different colours and varieties of fruit and vegetable – ideally leaving the peels on where possible! Aiming for at least 5 serves of veg and 2 serves of fruit per day.

• Legumes

• Nuts and seeds

• Wholegrains e.g. oats

• Healthy fats e.g. nuts, avocado, olive oil

Probiotics can also be beneficial as they contain live microbiota. Probiotics are generally found in fermented foods such as; yoghurt, kimchi, kefir and kombucha. It is not essential to take a probiotic supplement if you are eating a varied diet, however, there are circumstances where one may be beneficial to encourage growth of healthy bacteria within the gut [2].

Conversely, a diet higher in processed, more indulgent foods has been linked to low grade chronic inflammation and gut dysbiosis (imbalance of gut bacteria leading to common digestive issues), which increases the risk of mental health disorders, including anxiety and depression, and heightened risk of other disease [2].

Omega-3 Fatty Acids

Omega-3 fats are also linked with lower rates of inflammation in the body and reduced levels of anxiety, depression and memory dysfunction [1]. They are essential for brain development and functioning throughout the lifespan. The brain consists of a high concentration of lipids (fats) and omega-3 fats play a key role in the structure of cell membranes.

Some countries that follow diets incorporating a lot of fish have remarkably lower rates of depression, which is thought to be partly influenced by the omega-3 content of fish and its role in brain functioning [1].

Find omega-3 in:

• Oily fish e.g. salmon, tuna, mackerel, sardines

• Nuts and seeds e.g. walnuts, flax seed, chia seeds

• Plant oils e.g. flaxseed oil

• Fortified foods

Not only is omega 3 great for our mood and brain function but it also promotes cardiovascular and ocular health.

The mechanisms of how different nutrients and dietary patterns influence our mood and brain function are also very complex and can be deeply explored. The above provides a brief overview of just two elements to take into consideration, again supporting the idea of a balanced, varied diet focusing on wholefoods. Stay tuned for further information!

Author: Belinda Elwin, Dietitian & Nutritionist

References:

1. Swaney S. Nutrition and Mood – What’s the Connection?. NSW: Nutrition Australia. Source: https://nutritionaustralia.org/division/nsw/nutrition-and-mood-whats-the-connection/

2. Harvard School of Public Health. The Microbiome. MA: The Nutrition Source. Source: https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/nutritionsource/microbiome/#:~:text=In%20addition%20to%20family%20genes,of%20microbiota%20in%20the%20intestines.

3. Clapp M, Aurora N, Herrera L, Bhatia M, Wilen E, Wakefield S. Gut microbiota’s effect on mental health: The gut-brain axis. Clin Pract. 2017 Sep 15; 7(4): 987.

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